Cyrus Adler, Ph.D.

President of the American Jewish Historical Society; Former President of the Board of Directors of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America; Assistant Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D. C.

PHILIPSON, DAVID –
American rabbi; born at Wabash, Ind., Aug. 9, 1862; educated at the public schools of Columbus, Ohio, the Hebrew Union College of Cincinnati (graduated 1883; D.D. 1886), the University of Cincinnati (B.A. 1883), and Johns...

PHILLIPS –
American family, especially prominent in New York and Philadelphia, and tracing its descent back to Jonas Phillips, who emigrated from Germany to England in 1751 and thence to America in 1756. The genealogical tree of the family...

PHILLIPS –
American family, especially prominent in New York and Philadelphia, and tracing its descent back to Jonas Phillips, who emigrated from Germany to England in 1751 and thence to America in 1756. The genealogical tree of the family...

PHILLIPS –
American family, especially prominent in New York and Philadelphia, and tracing its descent back to Jonas Phillips, who emigrated from Germany to England in 1751 and thence to America in 1756. The genealogical tree of the family...

PHILLIPS, BARNET –
American journalist; born in Philadelphia Nov. 9, 1828; educated at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, whence he was graduated in 1847. Shortly afterward he set out for Europe, where he continued his studies and...

PHILLIPS, MORRIS –
American journalist and writer; born in London, England, May 9, 1834.Phillips received his elementary education in Cleveland, Ohio, and later continued his studies under private tutors in New York. He studied for the legal...

PHILLIPS, PHILIP –
American jurist; born in Charleston, S. C., Dec. 17, 1807; died in Washington, D. C., Jan. 14, 1884. He was educated at the Norwich Military Academy in Vermont and at Middletown, Conn. He then studied law and was admitted to the...

PITTSBURG –
Second largest city in the state of Pennsylvania. With Allegheny, the twin-city on the north side of the Allegheny River, it is the chief city of western Pennsylvania.There are no reliable records of the beginnings of the Jewish...

PIZMON –
Hymn with a refrain; usually the chief poem in the scheme of seliḥot sung or recited by the cantor and congregation in alternation. Of the many etymological derivations suggested for the word, "psalm" (Greek, Ψαλμός) seems the...

PONTE, LORENZO DA (JEREMIAH CONEGLIANO) –
Italian-American man of letters, composer, and teacher; born at Ceneda, Italy, 1749; died 1837. He belonged to a well-known Jewish family, which had produced the distinguished Italian-Turkish diplomatist Dr. Israel Conegliano....

POPPER, WILLIAM –
American Orientalist; born at St. Louis, Mo., Oct. 29, 1874; educated at the public schools of Brooklyn, N. Y., the College of the City of New York, Columbia College (A.B. 1896), and Columbia University (A.M. 1897; Ph.D. 1899)....

POVERTY –
Condition or proportion of poor in a population. Although the riches of the Jews have passed into a proverb, all social observers are agreed that the Jews have a larger proportion of poor than any of the European nations among...

PRAYER –
Biblical Data: From the earliest epochs recorded in the Bible profound distress or joyous exaltation found expression in prayer. However primitive the mode of worship, the individual is commonly depicted as petitioning or...

PRAYER-BOOKS –
First Prayer-Book. The collection, in one book, of the year's prayers for week-days, Sabbaths, holy days, and fast-days is generally known as the "Seder Tefillot," or simply the "Siddur." The first compilation known of the...

PULITZER, JOSEPH –
American editor and journalist; born April 10, 1847, at Budapest. Hungary; educated privately. In 1863 he left his native town for the United States, which he reached in time to enlist in the Federal army as a private in a...

PULPIT –
Facing the People. In the earliest time a post ("'ammud" was used instead of a pulpit; from it the king spoke to the people, and from it Josiah renewed with the people the covenant of the Law before the Lord (II Kings xi. 14,...

RAḤEM NA 'ALAW –
A dirge of the Sephardim, chanted by those taking part in the sevenfold processional circuit around the bier before interment (see Haḳḳafot), as depicted in the print by Picart, 1723, reproduced in Jew. Encyc. iii. 433 (see also...

RANSOHOFF, JOSEPH –
American physician; born in Cincinnati, Ohio, May 26, 1853. After graduating from the Medical College of Ohio (M.D. 1874), he studied surgery at the universities of Würzburg, Vienna, Berlin, Paris, and London (F.R.C.S. 1877)....

RAPPAPORT, PHILIP –
American lawyer and journalist; born in 1845, at Fürth, Bavaria, where he was educated. Removing to the United States in 1866, he became reporter for the "Freiheitsfreund," in Pittsburg. The following year he held the editorship...

RAUNHEIM, SALY (SAMUEL HIRSCH BEN MENAHEM) –
American mining-engineer; born in Frankfort-on-the-Main June 7, 1838; died in New York city Sept. 9, 1904. He was educated in his native city and at the universities of Heidelberg and Freiburg, and in 1861 became engaged in the...

RAYNER, ISIDOR –
American senator; born at Baltimore, Md., April 11, 1850. He was educated at the University of Virginia (1866-70), pursuing the academic course for three years and the law course for the last year. On leaving that institution he...

RAYNER, WILLIAM SOLOMON –
Merchant and financier; born in Oberelzbach, Bavaria, Sept. 23, 1822; died in Baltimore, Md., March 1, 1899. In 1840 he removed to the United States. Declining an offer of the position of religious teacher in the old Henry...

READING –
City of Berks county, Pa. A few Jewish immigrants settled here before 1847, when Reading became a city. In 1864 a cemetery plot was acquired in the southern part of the city, and in the same year Congregation Oheb Sholom was...

RECIFE (PERNAMBUCO) –
Brazilian city and seaport; capital of the state of Pernambuco. It was merely a collection of fishermen's huts when occupied by the French in 1561. Shortly afterward, however, it began to attract attention as a port. Both Recife...

REPRESENTATIVE THEMES –
Anticipating in some measure the modern use of the leitmotif, the cantors of the synagogues, as soon as the traditional material of their chants was fixed (by the beginning of the sixteenth century), introduced and extended the...